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Takashi Nakamichi
Nomura Holdings CEO Kentaro Okuda
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 23, 2025
Nomura CEO seeks to tap Japan investors’ private market bets
Kentaro Okuda is looking to Japanese investors who are seeking private markets as a way to diversify their assets.
Eric Trump, executive vice president of the Trump Organization, during the Bitcoin Asia conference in Hong Kong, China, in August. Japanese policymakers are taking a more positive view of crypto as U.S. President Donald Trump’s embrace of the assets bolsters the industry.
BUSINESS / Tech
Oct 21, 2025
Japan's FSA may allow banks to invest in crypto assets if risks are managed
The Financial Services Agency is also considering allowing banking groups to apply for licenses to operate cryptoexchanges, according to a source.
Japan's top financial leaders are working to ease fears that AI will cost jobs, emphasizing its role in boosting efficiency and transforming work.
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 10, 2025
Japan’s top bank CEOs push for AI, soothing worry over human work
In Japan, where the financial sector employs hundreds of thousands of people, the conversation over AI and its impact on work is picking up pace.
Nomura Holdings will require employees in Japan to spend two days a week in the office, double the current requirement.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 26, 2025
Nomura doubles minimum work-from-office requirement in Japan
The change is scheduled to take effect in spring next year, putting staff in Japan on par with Nomura’s global employees.
Criminals started hijacking online brokerage accounts in Japan and using them to drive up penny stocks around the world earlier this year.
BUSINESS
Aug 15, 2025
Japan brokers seek to identify hackers after fraud surges
Criminals started hijacking online brokerage accounts in Japan and using them to drive up penny stocks around the world earlier this year.
Net income at JPMorgan Chase & Co. in Japan more than doubled in the year ended March 31, reflecting a jump in merger advisory and underwriting business.
BUSINESS / Companies
Aug 6, 2025
JPMorgan leads foreign banks for Japan earnings amid dealmaking spree
Japanese companies have stepped up acquisitions as well as sales of noncore units in recent years, providing more opportunities for investment banks.
The Japan Securities Dealers Association and Japan Exchange Group are discussing ways to prevent a banned trade known as spoofing, after Nomura Holdings joined a list of brokerages fined for manipulating the instruments.
BUSINESS
Jul 31, 2025
Japan considers tighter oversight to avoid bond market ‘spoofing’
Spoofing involves placing fake orders to give market participants a false impression about supply and demand to make profitable trades.
Trevor Hill, former head of equity at SMBC Nikko Securities, arrives at the Tokyo District Court in Tokyo on Tuesday.
JAPAN / Crime & Legal
Jul 22, 2025
Former SMBC Nikko managers found guilty in market manipulation case
When the allegations of market manipulation surfaced in early 2022, they shone a spotlight on Japan’s financial sector and led to regulatory penalties against the brokerage.
Mizuho CEO Masahiro Kihara is interviewed in London on Monday.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 15, 2025
Mizuho CEO confident of meeting ¥1 trillion profit target
Japan’s third-largest lender forecast in May that net income will likely climb 6.1% to ¥940 billion in the fiscal year started in April.
Natixis has hired Makoto Kawamura, formerly head of JPMorgan Chase Bank’s Japan treasury and chief investment office in Tokyo, and Hideaki Sugahara, who was a director at Societe Generale, for its new banking business in Japan.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jul 1, 2025
Seeing growth potential, Natixis plans to double banking staff in Japan
The move comes as Paris-based Natixis starts a new banking branch in Tokyo, in the latest sign of a global financial firm vying for business opportunities in Japan.
Nomura Holdings shareholders have voted down a name change plan following a pair of scandals at the company.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 24, 2025
Nomura shareholders reject proposal to change company name
Investors also voted in favor of retaining CEO Kentaro Okuda and Chairman Koji Nagai as board members, the company said on its website.
Nomura Holdings Chief Executive Officer Kentaro Okuda
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 23, 2025
Nomura CEO’s pay more than doubles after profit hits record
Kentaro Okuda’s compensation rose to ¥1.208 billion ($8.2 million) in the year ended March 31, from ¥506 million a year earlier.
Goldman Sachs Asset Management Japan is expanding its business as Japanese institutional investors are increasingly willing to hire third parties to help oversee their trillions of dollars in assets.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 9, 2025
Goldman CIO service suddenly catches on in Japan after 10 years
The return of inflation after two decades has added pressure on Japan’s pensions and insurance companies to seek higher returns.
Daiwa Securities CEO Akihiko Ogino says mergers and acquisition deals are harder to come by this year due to uncertainties over U.S. President Donald Trump's trade policy.
BUSINESS / Companies
Jun 3, 2025
Daiwa pauses M&A hiring as tariff uncertainty chokes deal pipeline
The assessment from Japan’s second-largest brokerage indicates how changes in global trade policy are rippling through spending activity.
Nomura is in expansion mode in U.S. markets despite wider sentiments that are more worried about U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade policies overshadowing global growth prospects.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 30, 2025
Nomura sees great opportunities to grow in U.S. despite turmoil
The firm plans to advance targets for its investment management and wholesale banking businesses by pursuing long-term growth in the Americas.
A shareholder of Nomura Holdings has made a proposal seeking to change the company’s name to Nomura Securities Group.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 28, 2025
Nomura faces rare vote on shareholder's proposal of a name change
The proposal seeks to change the company’s name to Nomura Securities Group, which its board opposes.
Compensation paid in the year that ended in March to Nomura Holdings' seven executive officers totaled ¥4.6 billion, up 3% from the previous year when there were eight such officers.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 23, 2025
Nomura raises top executives’ pay to highest in over a decade
Compensation paid in the year ended March to the company’s seven executive officers totaled ¥4.6 billion.
Goldman Sachs’ unit in Japan, although posting lower profit last year, kept its spot as the most profitable among foreign banks in the country that close their books in December.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 19, 2025
Goldman Sachs leads in a patchy year for foreign banks in Japan
The varied results suggest that 2024 was a tricky year for the world’s largest lenders operating in Japan, as investors adjusted to rising interest rates.
SMBC Nikko Securities hired former Nomura Holdings senior executive Susumu Usui as co-head of equity and ex-Citigroup’s Keita Matsumoto as head of financial markets.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 7, 2025
SMBC Nikko hires former Nomura and Citi top executives in rebuild
The firm is seeking to strengthen its business following the rigging scandal more than two years ago, which led to the loss of several equity executives.
The Otemachi Financial City Grand Cube, which houses the Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities head office, in Tokyo. MUMSS has stopped selling so-called structured loans after purchases of the products by regional banks prompted a regulatory backlash.
BUSINESS / Companies
May 2, 2025
MUFG joint venture stops selling structured loans after scrutiny
It’s the first known instance of a major brokerage ending this business in what was a booming market.

Longform

The byzantine process for converting a foreign driver’s license into a Japanese one entails mountains of paperwork and significant stamina — unless you're a lucky license holder from a country or region where these requirements are waived.
Driving in Japan isn’t hard. Getting the license is.